


The Fall of Haven

by Tjerra14



Series: Rifts [3]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Also wrote this instead of studying, Chant of Light, Doubt, Dragon Age oneshot, Dragon Age: Inquisition Spoilers, Gen, Post-In Your Heart Shall Burn, Tons of Snow, meeting an old friend
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-18
Updated: 2018-08-18
Packaged: 2019-06-29 03:55:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,386
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15721473
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tjerra14/pseuds/Tjerra14
Summary: There was a fall, then an impact, and darkness.After causing one last slide burying Haven to help the overrun Inquisition forces to escape, Imira Trevelyan wakes up in the darkness of the old mining tunnels underneath the village. The fall has saved her life - for now, at least, as it almost seems impossible to find a way out, or rejoin her soldiers. But what else can she do then but try?





	The Fall of Haven

**Author's Note:**

  * For [philliam](https://archiveofourown.org/users/philliam/gifts).



> First and foremost, this whole thing wouldn't exist if not for @catharsis96, who listened to me complaining about sitting on half a sentence with no story to put it in (and funnily enough, it's neither the first nor the last) and immediately suggested "that scene right after Haven, when you're struggling to get through the mountains, all on your own." As it turns out, we both weren't really satisfied with the game's portrayal of that scene, as it just didn't seem desparate enough.  
> So I went ahead and wrote another oneshot, this time with my canon Inquisitor, Imira Trevelyan. Which turned out to be quite a challenge, as my exams were taking up most of my mental capacity and it's not always easy to write about snowstorms with 41°C in your room. But in the end, this basically gave me back some of the joy I used to feel when writing, so ... yeah. 
> 
> Chant of Light verses taken from the New Cumberland Chant of Light Abridged Version to be found in "World of Thedas Vol.2", mostly Canticle of Andraste, but also two verses from the Canticle of Transfigurations.

_“All this is yours,” spake the World-maker._

_“Join Me in heaven and sorrow no more.”_

Andraste 1:12

**The Fall of Haven**

9:41 Dragon

 

There was a fall, then an impact, and darkness.

_Fire, searing heat on her back pressed against the rocky earth covered in puddles of molten snow, ears ringing of the shrieks of a dragon and the sound of thousand-year-old laughter; or had there been an explosion, another one to equal the one that had send her into the Fade?_

_Or maybe there had been only one, the one that had started it all, and she was still trapped somewhere, nowhere, and all she thought that had happened was an illusion, figments of imagination gone wild._

_But it couldn’t be, there was a voice, his voice, echoing in the smoke-filled mountain air like it did in the trembling Chantry as the dragon was soaring overhead, despite everything trying to be confident, trusting, full of hope, ‘Perhaps you’ll surprise it, find a way –’_

_And somewhere, beyond opened doors inviting rays of sunlight onto the marble floor, there was the faint smell of late flowering lilac …_

Imira gasped as pain pierced her left arm, originating somewhere inside the fiery green orb that was once her marked hand, only to have it replaced with a fierce stinging sensation in her ribcage making it almost impossible to breathe. And yet – breathing meant she was still alive, and the agony that came with it assured her she had escaped the Fade’s grip.

_Still alive._

It couldn’t be, and it wouldn’t, with the uncaring stone floor’s cold seeping into her body, settling down in her limbs; and the pervasive darkness, whispering just loud enough for her to _hear_ it, but not to understand its words. As if she needed more understanding. The mountain passes, and with them the tunnels underneath, knew only one language, and it was death’s.

_Maybe you’ll surprise it …_

She had surprised it, hadn’t she? She had defied defeat with a sword in her hands, a sword that probably wouldn’t even had scratched the scales of that dragon, but the moment that flare reddened the sky it destroyed a whole village. And then everything that had been left was to run, hoping she’d make it before death presented her with a snowy grave, knowing it was already too late.

She had made it, against all odds. Yet, time hadn’t been reset, and each rattling breath piercing her side became the seconds ticking away on the clock of what was left of her life.

The numbness in her hands and feet encouraged Imira to get up, deadened fingers scraping over stone, insensate soles struggling to regain their footing, failing, falling, trying again. Moving was worse than breathing, but it was her only chance.

No one would look for her down here, if they’d even bother in the first place. Did they even know she was still alive? Of course not, _how could they_ , for all they might have seen from their relative safety was the mountain itself swallowing Haven, the last uproar of their beaten resistance, the price they had to pay for their escape.

Imira started down the bleakest current, one step after another, hands pressed onto her ribs trying to keep the pain inside, tangible, manageable, slow defiance of the impossible in a fruitless attempt of survival.

_By gods forsaken, fate emptied of hope_

The sound of her footsteps on the stony floor and her sharp, short-winded breath joined the chilling wind patrolling the tunnels in its lament; and the loneliness grew cold and empty, a scorned lover still vying to be her only companion.

_Wounded I fell then, by grief arrow-studded,_

_Never to heal, death for me to come._

There seemed to be a light ahead, casting flickering, greenish shadows over the frost-covered walls, silhouettes of demons dancing on the edges of the darkness lurking right at her fingertips, threatening to consume the slowly fading glow the Mark still emitted.

_A light? Down here?_

For a moment she tried to pin it on her bustling imagination, inspired by the events of the last hours, by the sheer exhilaration of surviving in the first place, no matter the bleakness of reality.

Then a surge of energy washed over her and the by-now familiar sting in her left hand made it more real than the sudden flash of green erupting from the Mark: There was a rift here.

_Maker preserve me._

She could feel if not see it yet, right there, where the winding tunnel opened into a bigger chamber, and she knew the demons felt her presence as well. Imira had never attempted to fight them on their own, or without careful preparation, and even though she had been called reckless numerous times in the past, there was a line even she wasn’t willing to cross. Especially when it came to demons. But what choice did she have?

_The Light shall lead her safely_

_Through the paths of this world, and into the next._

The dissonant shrieks of a despair demon sent shivers down her spine as she reluctantly moved forward, the energy of the Fade prickling at her fingertips. Or was it the cold they emanated, fusing with the wintery breath of the Frostbacks, transforming the wraiths into what seemed to be strangely solid iciness?

It didn’t matter. They had sensed her, and she barely managed to create a barrier in time when they launched their first attack.

Fighting had always been a dance for Imira, each twist, each twirl, each flip of her fingers etched into her muscles, movements gracefully flowing into each other as lightning flickered around her as if the storm her magic had called was a deadly dancing partner. One misplaced step, one mistimed turn, and she would trip and fall over – but instead of becoming the laughing stock of nobility, the demons would press on their advantage, and she knew her barrier wouldn’t be able to take it.

For a split second, she lost her footing whirling around as her ribs screamed in protest and she could _feel_ the demons crying out in triumph, she had made a mistake, that was all they needed –

Her left hand burst into emerald pain, the Mark ripping open her carefully guarded connection to the Fade, merging with something older, deeper, _more powerful_ , pulling it over, into reach. The rift exploded into a blaze of green, engulfing the demons, blinding her; then fading into darkness, leaving behind ghosts of the past, shadowy figures wearing familiar faces, _so_ _painfully familiar faces._

Not shadows. There was something undeniably corporeal about the battered Templar armour he was wearing, the way the draught ruffled his hair and the flame of his torch as he drew closer, blade in hand.

He was real.

“Aidan?” Imira gasped, taken aback, “H … how?”

He smiled, just like he always did, and although something seemed off, she suddenly felt as if some missing part was returned to her, completed like one of those puzzles she used to do with her brothers before the Circle, children in happier times.

_‘Heart that is broken, beats still unceasing,_

_An ocean of sorrow does nobody drown._

_You have forgotten, spear-maid of Alamarr._

_Within My creation, none are alone.’_

“I could ask the same of you,” Aidan said, sheathing his sword, “I wasn’t expecting someone else to be down here, to be honest. Especially not …” His voice trailed off, transforming his smile into something more anxious as his gaze locked onto the Mark’s eerie glow prompting Imira to cover her hand.

“What … what is that … thing?”

She could see the Templar in him recognizing the Fade intertwined with an unknown kind of magic, inspiring cautiousness, _fear_ even, ready to reach for his weapon; but there was also her friend, trusting and ever-curious, wondering what had happened to her, just as she did.

“I …” It was surprisingly difficult to talk about it, Imira noticed. In Haven, with the Inquisition, everyone had known who she was, and if they didn’t, _someone_ – Cassandra, mostly – would make sure that shortcoming was rectified. How many times had she heard the story of the woman dropping out of the Breach, unharmed if not for the Mark that seemed to be both their salvation and undoing? Yet, recounting it herself, for Aidan, who had known her _from before_ , it didn’t only seem unbelievable, but the tale of a slobbering madwoman.

“I’d say you’ve gone completely insane, but then again …” He shook his head. “I saw that thing – that _rift_ as you called it – when I came in here, and now – you really have power over those things?”

“I can close them, yes. Other than that …” Imira fell silent, realizing why he seemed so different, even though he looked just like the last time they had seen each other, joking about all those grim faces surrounding them, hugging and promising each other to meet again as soon as they found some time between all those apparently important speeches they had to attend to at the Conclave. It wasn’t the dirt on his bruised face, he had often looked like that after one of their squabbles, it wasn’t the rough state the new armour they gave him at the Temple of Sacred Ashes was now in, it wasn’t the fine wrinkles around his eyes she never had noticed before. It was him, all by himself: _He was alone._

“Where’s Moira?”

They had been each other’s shadows for years when Imira challenged Aidan to a duel during their training sessions, Moira invisible until she tried to talk him out of _that_ _useless fight against a mage_ , and she soon realized the two templar recruits were basically inseparable, brother and sister in everything but blood, and with time, she slowly became friends with them, and after that, family.

As she saw all joy vanishing from his eyes, Imira knew she didn’t want to hear the answer.

“She’s … dead,” Aidan murmured, his voice flat.

“Dead?” she echoed slowly. It couldn’t be. He must’ve meant something else, _gone to find some lyrium for us_ perhaps, she must’ve misheard – Moira couldn’t be … Back in the Circle, when they still dared to joke about these things, they had always said Imira would be the first to die if they ever got separated, killed in some stupid fight she’d pick with the wrong person; and Aidan would’ve been next, eager to get his revenge as soon as he’d found out. And Moira, level-headed, diplomatic Moira would be the only one to prevail in the outside world.

_Little did we know back then._

 “How?” Did she even want to know?

“We … we were running from the Breach,” he began, eyes fixed on the ground, “Somehow … somehow we lost each other. I … I never saw her again afterwards.”

 _We lost each other._ Of course they had. All the bad things that happened would’ve never had their way with them had they stayed together, where they belonged. _We should’ve never left the Circle._

“Maybe she’s still out there somewhere? Maybe –” The pain in his sad smile as he finally looked up made her stop.

_What choice did we have?_

“I’ve spent the last weeks looking for her. All I ever found were ashes. And now with that storm,” Aidan sighed, gesticulating into the darkness of the tunnels beyond where the wind mourned a loss of its own, “I came in here to seek shelter, but I didn’t get very far because of that rift.”

 “A storm?” Had there been a storm building up when they fought Corypheus? She didn’t know, but how would she, with churning dark clouds gathering in the sky being the least of their concerns?

He frowned, his gaze wandering over her torn cloak, the dried blood – she didn’t even know whose, and did it matter? – splattered on her vest, the ash still clinging to her hair. “How long have you been out?”

“I … I don’t know,” she shrugged, “Too long, probably. I – I need to find the others. The Inquisition.”

Aidan looked like she just told him more bad news. But could there be worse news than Moira’s death?

“Now? It’s pretty stupid to go out there during that storm, and you’re injured,” he objected, gesturing in the general direction of her broken ribs. He must’ve noticed her shallow breathing, her slightly slouched-over posture, the hand that was occasionally clutching at the stinging, must’ve remembered it from the countless times someone had smacked him too hard during training. He had never been good in dodging blows.

“I don’t care,” she retorted, gritting her teeth as her temper riled up the pain, “They’re fleeing, and they won’t … they won’t wait for me.”

“Why are you following them, then? Do you really think they will miss you?”

He had a point, they most likely thought she was dead, _by all means_ _she was supposed to be dead_ , and they wouldn’t notice if she went her own ways, with Aidan, as he clearly hoped, just like they did in the past, all three – yet they were only two of them now, and something had changed. _She_ had changed.

“I promised.”

He snorted, “We made all kinds of promises over the course of the years, didn’t we?”

She knew where this was going, knew the answer to the question he never asked. _How many did we keep?_ What did they matter?

“You – you could come and join us,” Imira suggested after a pause. It seemed like the only future they had left at this point, both of them re-joining the Inquisition, mending the world together, finally living up to their naive promises of never getting separated again. Maybe the Maker had intended her survival after all, because ultimately everything happened for a reason, didn’t it?

“But why would I? Why would you? They left you, they won’t even look for you, you said so yourself. They don’t care about you!”

_But you do, don’t you?_

Moira had always joked about how Aidan’s loyalty to Imira seemed to be a bit more than just loyalty, but she had always dismissed the notion. He was her brother, after all, the only brother she gained when she came into her magic and lost all the others. But down here in the deserted, cold tunnels, with her words echoing somewhere in Imira’s mind, his concern and that fear of losing her, _again_ , on his face, Moira was right. Moira had always been right.  

“We would be safe with them, Aidan. No more running from the Carta. No more hiding from nobles who heard some complaints about a group of three young strangers stealing and poaching in their domain. We even have a secured source of lyrium – you must be running out, anyway –”

“We managed on our own,” he countered, stubborn as ever.

“Managed? You call it ‘managed’?” It took all of what little self-control she had left to not just slap him. _Moira would’ve talked sense into him already. Oh, Moira …_ “Have you forgotten what we did?”

_‘Your dagger, Aidan.’_

 “What _you_ did,” Aidan corrected her.

“You could’ve stopped me. Maker knows Moira tried to stop me, but you didn’t. _It was your dagger._ How is that my fault alone?”

She had felt a darkness equalling the one watching them standing in these tunnels stirring inside her that day, raising its head, drinking in the metallic scent of spilled blood in the heavy, rain-filled air, a smell that became as nauseating to her as lilac.

“We did what we had to do,” he said, intently examining the flickering shadows the torchlight cast on the floor.

“We shouldn’t have killed him,” Imira whispered, “He wasn’t a threat.”

_We all knew it._

Aidan remained silent, as he had back then, silently handing over his dagger, following her lead as he always had. Without questioning.

“Please.” Her voice broke.

There was another pause, then he sighed, “Fine.”

Maybe there was a future left for them somewhere, after all. _Find a way._

The storm hit them like an armoured fist as soon as they left the tunnels, cutting through their clothes as if they were made of silks instead of heavy leather and wool. They had to keep moving, though, and soon the cold’s sting faded into numbness and the numbness in turn faded into something that felt like an eternity, one step after another after another, their boots heavy with clumps of ice, their cloaks whitened until they resembled the gleaming desert they tried to protect themselves from.

At least they were together.

The blanket of snow seemed perfect, undisturbed, if not for a timid column of smoke rising from a blackened spot a few feet in front of them.

“Embers? Recent?” It was difficult to form her shivering lips into words that would break the icy wall against her face the storm had become. “Do you – can you see it?”

The wind answered in howling silence.

“Aidan?”

Maybe he hadn’t heard her, deaf to anything else than the tunes of the mountain passes and the wolves stalking them, coming closer with each step they took, threatening them in their companionship.

“Aidan!”

Imira turned around, gasping as her broken ribs protested the suddenness of the movement, blinking as the snow blinded her with the storm’s full force. She half expected him to stumble into her, just as sightless as she was, grabbing at her torn cloak in a desperate attempt not to fall, _making everything even worse, and still being there for the better_. He’d be out of breath, _like all those years ago_ , when they chased each other over the Circle Tower’s courtyard, wooden swords in hand, laughing, while the Knight-Commander would be standing in the wall’s shadow, shaking his head and smiling at the same time, because _how could he not_ , seeing these children enjoying themselves despite all the animosity they had to endure? And next to him, with that warm, kind look in her eyes, _her mothe_ –

_Oh, Lydia. I – By the Maker, Aidan, where are you?_

How could she have lost him? He had been right next to her all the time, as they both knew they _had_ to stick together to survive, just like they did back in Ferelden, when there was still three of them, and this time they wouldn’t make the same mistake again. Everything went downhill the moment they had split up, Aidan and Moira joining the other Templars and her meeting up with the Loyalists who were desperate for her help even though they knew she wasn’t one of them. And then –

There was something just beneath the snowy surface, barely visible as it was losing its struggle not to get blanketed.

“Aidan!”

He must’ve fallen without her noticing, and in her state of distraction she had kept on going, overhearing his cries for help. For he must’ve called out for help, he couldn’t have just collapsed, giving in to the cold and those compelling stories of peace and reunion the darkness beyond it told.

_He mustn’t have._

The snow did its best to claim Aidan as its own, for how long could he have been lying there, _mere seconds_? Yet, if not for his black hair forming a harsh contrast to the impenetrable whiteness around only the wolves would’ve found him, later, when she would’ve joined him on the ground; or maybe not even them, leaving him to wait for the sunlight of the next spring to free him from its icy grasp.

“By the Maker, Aidan, can you hear me?”

He didn’t answer, but then again, how could he, with the storm choking him, the wind whisking away each and every one of his laboured breaths?

For he _must’ve_ been fighting, still holding on somehow, stubborn as he was, knowing she would help him, knowing he could rely on her, that they both could rely _on each other_ , just as they did in Ferelden, with curious eyes staring at them everywhere they went, and Carta knives thirsting for revenge lurking in every corner.

He couldn’t just have …

_He mustn’t._

Beneath the snow hiding away the breastplate’s charred metal the Templar armour she had believed to be Aidan’s had become his final resting place. Or was it him, after all, were those his features underneath the frozen burnt skin, were those his lips, _his ever-smiling lips_ , now twisted into a never-ending scream? Imira couldn’t tell, didn’t want to.

Whoever he had been, he was long gone. As was Moira. _Aidan._

_You were the only one that survived._

Finally, the truth.

They had told her the day she stumbled out of the Fade, and nearly every day since. It had been a miracle, _she_ had been a miracle, chosen by the Maker Himself, _Imira Trevelyan, the fabled Herald of Andraste_ , and yet, she believed – _knew_ – she couldn’t have been the only one. And even if she really was, she hadn’t seen her friends for days when it happened, maybe they hadn’t been there, maybe they went to a safe distance, went – _somewhere, guiding more Templars through the mountain passes?_

It had been a vain hope, and she had been clinging to it with all her might, as each alternative seemed worse than the hole in the sky, worse than death mocking her with her own hand.

They had always said Imira would be the first to die if they ever got separated, and yet here she was, still alive, the last of them.

_All I ever found were ashes._

_Figments of imagination._

The Mark flared up, blinding her; rendering the storm and the mountains green, then dazzlingly white, then grey and rocky and _strange_ ; and then all that was left was her magic crying out triumphantly, unfolding, taking over.

_I can’t remember._

_It had looked different these countless times she had been here before, less alien, less … frightening. Less forbidden. She had made the Fade her own, she believed, a part of herself where she stored her magic like books in a library, rows and rows of shelves forming the walls of a labyrinth keeping the demons trapped within. And yet – it felt familiar, even if she didn’t recognize it in the desolation surrounding her, the marble floor catching lonely spots of sunlight, and the sad song of a bird in the lilac bushes …_

  _No, it couldn’t be, not again, not after all those years, it was impossible._

_It was still the Fade, however, a new, menacing part of it, exactly what they had warned her about back in the Circle; trying to trick her just as it had tricked those Templars, glancing nervously up into the sky, where the Breach grew between heartbeats. And somewhere, beyond smoke-stained mountaintops, thousands burned as the Maker averted His gaze._

Imira gasped, the needles puncturing her expanding lungs dispelling the Fade’s spidery fingers trying to get hold of her. 

There had been more of them, distant enough, yet still too close, fleeing the demons trying to reach the mountain pass, running, stumbling, crawling; trying to find somewhere _safe_ from all the sudden madness, somewhere their swords would protect them again, giving them a chance of survival. But the madness took up the sky and so it had found them, helpless prey without as much time as to draw their weapons.   

_Mighty of arm and warmest of heart,_

_Rendered to dust._

Burned corpses, buried in the snow, smothered even in death – and there was no one else out here but the wolves and the dead. Never had been.

_Bitter is sorrow,_

_Ate raw and often, poison that weakens and does not kill._

_The embers?_

It couldn’t be. It was a desperate hope, _another one_ , and even though mere days ago she’d have jumped at the idea of overcoming the impossible, it was like Varric had said with the Breach staring down on them – they needed a miracle, and she already had depleted them.

_Eyes sorrow-blinded, in darkness unbroken_

_There ‘pon the mountain, a voice answered my call._

_He wouldn’t._ There was no one here. _Not even the Maker._

Even if there was, she couldn’t go on. She wouldn’t make it anyway. And she had known it, right from the beginning, with the Mark consuming her every thought each time the Breach expanded; knew it even when they had laughed and danced under the healed sky, _oh, those blissful moments of sudden confidence_ ; had been reassured when she had ordered Cullen to take all his soldiers and leave instead of letting them die in a futile attempt to hold back Corypheus’s forces. All this – her survival, _once again_ , against all odds, her senseless shivering stumbling through the Frostback’s storms – was nothing more than an illusion. Like Aidan.   

_Perhaps you’ll surprise it, find a way –_

Maybe she was the Herald of Andraste. Maybe she had been chosen by the Maker, to play her role in a plan she couldn’t even hope to understand. Maybe she had simply fulfilled her part. She had closed the Breach, she had saved hundreds of people, maybe that was the only reason He had spared her at the Conclave?

_Corypheus is still out there._

Would he still be a threat if she was gone, though? He didn’t come after the Inquisition when he invaded Haven. He came after her. Her Mark. And maybe, _just maybe_ , if she had died sealing the Breach –

But she didn’t. _Another mistake._

_‘How should Your children apology make?’_

The howling of the wolves was now clearly audible, the tenor voice to the wailing of the wind. Imira took a deep breath ignoring the suddenly renewed pain in her side – _alive, how was she still alive_ – and closed her eyes.

 _Find a way …_ He had smiled uneasily as he said it, knowing it was futile, a notion not even worth entertaining while there was so much else he – they both – had to concentrate on. _Did I ever tell him how beautiful his smile was?_

Not that it mattered now. Or ever would. The snow welcomed her with open arms, a tender embrace she had forgotten she longed for.

_‘We have forgotten, in ignorance stumbling,_

_Only a Light in this darken’d time breaks._

_Call to Your children, teach us Your greatness._

_What has been forgotten has not yet been lost.’_

It wasn’t even that cold anymore.

_Oh Maker, please forgive me._


End file.
